The clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1883-1888, 1887-03-09
IN THE OIL REGIONS.
The Noteworthy Struggle thai Wound VI
the Career of n Phenomenal Town.

The topic was draw poker. and it had
been suggested to a group Of half
dozen New Workers in the Astor House
rotunda by a newspaper paragraph
which said that the little town of State
Line was the greatest place for poker
playing in all the oil regions.
''Well, that's saying a good deal"
said man in the group, for consider
ing, the size of their average pile, the
oil-feld poker sharps will stick to
pair of aces as faithfully as anybody
that ever took cards"
'But / knew of an oil town that in
the summer of 1882 had about $4,000
Inhabitants the same man went on,
''and by November of that year the sole
industry of the town was draw poker.
1t was the town of Garfield, in Warren
county. In the early part of the sum-
mer the first wild cat well in the Cherry
Groove district blew the drill out of the
hole and began flooding the region
with oil. Within few weeks a rail-
road was running over logs through the
hemlock forest, city of shanties and
tents had sprung up, and the drilling
wells were so thick that the bull wheels
almost rubbed against one another. 1t
was estimated that $4,000 persons were
on top of that barren hill; there were
theatres, dance houses. pool rooms, and
gambling hells; all the noted fighters of
the oil region were there, and the boom
was the biggest thing of its kind ever
seen in this country.
but the oil came out like water from
q blister after half a dozen wells had
been sunk, and by the time snow fell
every well was dry hole. About the
only persons left there when ! visited
the town, just before the holidays, were
the keeper of what had been the princi-
pal hotel, a Hebrew clothier, and
Chinese laundryman The hotel man
had big house on his hands, and was
waiting for a chance to sell it for old
lumber. The Hebrew clothier's pecu-
liarity was that he came there in his
shirt sleeves, and no man ever had seen
him have coat OH. The Chinaman
was SO fascinated by jack pots that he
| couldn't get away. These three resi-
dents had settled down to poker play
ing, evidently TO see which of the three
should have what money they had left
They played in room that had been
| occupied by the Sunday school of the
First Methodist Church. Every morn
| iD2. alltI AttS BIEdkiAot. ltlc uOhct
keeper buttoned up his great coat and
walked leisurely to the poker room. the
clotnier's white shirt sleeves flashed
around the corner. and the flowing toy
| gerry of the Chinaman fluttered in the
blast as he joined the two other men.
They kept up the game till late at
night. was there three days, and saw
no other industry.
The next spring was in Warren, and
inquired how the game came out The
Chinaman' weakness for jack pots
ruined him, they said, and he was last
seen striking out cross lots for Oil City.
the Hebrew clothier hung on better, but
| his caution in the matter of bluiling en-
abled the hotel man gradually to break
| him by taking an ante out of him every
time he had the ace or drew cards. He
went away in his shirt sleeves in a
clustering snow storm about the lst Of
March. The hotel-keeper had a pipe of
natural gas running into his bar-room
stove, and he sat by the fire till warm
weather, and then opened another house
up in the New York oil field.''